|
COLLECTIONS West Europe
Collection Highlights:
Curator(s) Introduction
The West European Collection consists of approximately 350,000 books in the various Western languages; 3,000 periodical and newspaper titles, of which 535 are currently received; 15,000 pamphlets; 20,000 posters; and more than 800 archival units.
History At the end of the First World War, Herbert Hoover assigned Ralph H. Lutz, a young Stanford historian, the task of collecting primary and secondary source material to document the important political, social, and economic changes taking place in Europe. The emphasis was placed on acquiring government documents, periodicals, newspapers, pamphlets, posters, photographs, ephemera, and monographs in the various European languages in the fields of history, politics and government, economics, and international relations. Book dealers and purchasing agents were recruited in the various countries to search for and acquire this specialized material. The publications of the League of Nations, for example, were received on deposit and formed the basis for an important international documents collection. The steady growth in the 1920s and 1930s was interrupted with the outbreak of World War II, but the established contacts with the library's old book dealers in Austria, France, Italy, and Germany were resumed immediately after the war. A concentrated collecting effort at that time, in cooperation with the Library of Congress, resulted in an avalanche of documentation from the wartorn countries of Europe, foremost a substantial set of records of the International Military Tribunal. The collapse of the totalitarian governments in Italy and Germany offered an especially fertile opportunity for gathering books, periodicals, and archives documenting their history. Increasing post-World War II interest in the non-Western world led to the pision of the collection, which until then was still undifferentiated by areas, into various geographic collections. The Central and Western European Collection became a separate but major unit in the new organizational structure. Collecting efforts continue in response to political and social changes, as well as technological developments. Videos, microform, oral histories, and CD-ROMs have now been added to the traditionally collected materials. Agnes F. Peterson was curator of the West European Collection from 1954 until 1993, when she retired with emerita status. During 1993-2001 the West European Collection and the East/Central European Collection were united into one European Collection. Lewis Gann was the curator of this unit from 1993-1995. In 1995 Maciej Siekierski took over these duties. Within this organizational structure West European collection was directed by Helen Solanum, Senior Specialist for Western Europe. In 2001 after the pision of the European Collection, Elena S. Danielson became curator of the West European Collection (Maciej Siekierski remains the curator of the East/Central European Collection). Description
Major library and archival coverage on Germany begins with the founding of the First Reich and the Reichstag debates of 1871. German participation in European politics and World War I is represented by extensive holdings of trench papers, personal narratives, government documents, reviews of the foreign press, manuscript materials, prisoner-of-war letters, sketchbooks, and posters. The November 1918 revolution and its aftermath, including the founding of the Kommunistische Partei Deutschlands and its journal Die Rote Fahne, are covered in documentary studies, journals, and revolutionary tracts. A large collection of secondary literature, official government documents, newspapers, and periodicals serve to document the history of the Weimar Republic. The National Socialist period (1933-45) is represented by the writings of Adolf Hitler, Joseph Goebbels, and Alfred Rosenberg and by a nearly complete edition of the Völkischer Beobachter and other periodicals. Parts of the original diaries of Goebbels and of Heinrich Himmler are held in the archives. A major historical source for this period are the l50 microfilm reels of the records of the NSDAP (Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei) Hauptarchiv, filmed by the Hoover Institution with approval of the Department of State at the Berlin Document Center in 1969/70. The collection also holds extensive literature on concentration camps and the Holocaust and a substantial set of records of the International Military Tribunal at Nuremberg. The library holdings documenting World War II from the German perspective include the official multivolume history Kriegstagebuch des Oberkommandos der Wehrmacht, 1940-45; regimental histories and personal memoirs; and a nearly complete file of Zeitschriftendienst (1939-44), issued by the Propaganda Ministry. A longheld but only recently accessible collection of Nazi-era school textbooks is also located at Hoover. For the postwar period in Germany, special attention has been paid to the documents of the Allied occupation, the separate governments established in the two Germanys, the emergence and continuance of political parties of all shades of opinion, the new left, student uprisings and university reform, and self-images and self-questioning in both German states. Of great practical use is the index on microfiche and Herbert Weiss's instructions concerning the microfilms of the Office Military Government, U.S. Zone, filmed in Washington by the Bundesarchiv and the Munich Institut für Zeitgeschichte. Pre- and postwar German affairs are covered by a series of microfilms of State Department Central Files. For the immediate postwar period the Briegleb and the William Sander Collections in the archives contain reports on political, economic, and social conditions for the years 1945-1949, while the library holds the publications of the various zonal governments. Materials on the founding of the Federal Republic and the Democratic Republic in 1949 include documentation on events in both parts of Germany and their relations to each other and to the rest of the world; vast collections of leaflets and periodicals of various parties; materials on Berlin; books, pamphlets, and photos of the 1948-49 airlift and the raising of the wall in 1963; and important archival holdings of reports by onetime political prisoners in East German jails (1950-75). The fall of the Berlin Wall is documented by a collection of monographs, pamphlets, periodicals, newspapers, and ephemera distributed at protest rallies and on the street. The coverage on France begins with the outbreak of World War I and continues through to the present. Among the more substantial areas of coverage are the two world wars, foreign relations in the interwar period, decolonization, the war in Algeria, the establishment and growth of the Fifth Republic, the May 1968 student uprising, the change in 1981 from a conservative to a socialist government, and all general elections to the present. World War I holdings include the 92-volume Les Armées françaises dans la grande guerre, issued by the Imprimerie Nationale and the 100-volume Collections de mémoires, études et documents pour servir à l'histoire de la guerre mondiale, issued in Paris between 1920 and l936 and covering both official and unofficial propaganda and information efforts. The eighteen scrapbooks of Stéphane Lauzanne, editor of the influential newspaper Le Matin (1920-40), are a good source for the interwar period, as is the periodical published by Roger Mennevée, Documents politiques, diplomatiques et financiers (1920-40). Of particular interest are the records of the postwar government investigation of the Commission chargée d'enquêter les évènements survenus en France 1933-45 (11 volumes published in 1949-50). World War II is extensively documented, both from the Vichy and the Free French side, by trench papers, periodicals, and files of the Free French Journal officiel issued in London and Algiers. Other primary sources include underground newspapers and periodicals, minutes of COMAC (Comité d'action militaire du Conseil national de la résistance), and an archival collection on Pierre Laval, deposited by his son-in-law René de Chambrun. Of particular interest for French wartime history is a collection of French resistance materials that were copied in the resistance archives in Paris at the request of the French Committee of the Hoover Library. Fifth Republic holdings include ephemeral material such as leaflets, pamphlets, and posters; "professions de foi" for the general elections (1958-81) issued by the various prefectures for the candidates of all parties; monographs; biographies; memoirs; and studies in a variety of languages. Important holdings for the war in Algeria include, among others, the following periodicals: Le Bled: Hebdomadaire militaire d'information (1958-62); L'écho d'Alger (1957-61); Le Pied noir (1963-66); and El Moudjahid (1957-62), the major clandestine journal of the Algerian Front of National Liberation issued in Tunis, as well as a later reprint issued in Yugoslavia. For the May 1968 student revolt the library holds short runs of periodicals, sets of leaflets, some posters, and other ephemeral documentation, as well as monographs, reminiscences, and accounts. The presidential elections of 1969, 1974, 1981, 1988, and, 1995 are all documented. Current collecting efforts concentrate on the rise of right-wing movements, immigration policy, relations with Germany, economic ties with East European countries, and publications by and about the European Union. The British Collection is strong on material on the two world wars, British foreign relations between the wars, decolonization, and, most important, the Labour Party. One of the first major acquisitions in 1919 was the Wellington House library of British wartime propaganda pamphlets. Holdings cover Great Britain's history in World War I and postwar events from the British point of view in Documents on British Foreign Policy (1919-39). The tension-ridden period between the wars is highlighted by special materials on the General Strike of May 1926, by the publications of the International Brigade Association for the Spanish Civil War, and by the newspaper New Times and Ethiopian News for the Abyssinian war. Documentation on the official history of World War II is shared with Stanford University Libraries. Over the years the Jonsson Library of Government Documents in Stanford University Libraries has built an excellent collection on Cabinet Office and Foreign Office materials on microform. A good source on internal politics and social policy is Tom Harrison's Mass Observation Archives for 1937-1941, on microfilm. The Harvester Press microfiche set entitled Britain and Europe since 1945 reproduces all the ephemeral literature for and against British entry into the European Communities and its uneasy and tempestuous membership. The heart of the collection consists of a rich selection of material published by the various political parties. The most important and substantive is the documentation on the Labour Party and its various predecessors and allies, such as the Independent Labour Party and the Fabians. Pamphlets, leaflets, reports of the annual conferences, and minutes of the National Executive Committee (some on microform), as well as newspapers and periodicals, make up this collection. Complementing these holdings are the general minute books of the Trades Union Congress, available on microfilm, and its pamphlets and leaflet series. For the British Conservative and Unionist Party, the library holds pamphlets and leaflets from 1868 and the minutes of the Executive Committee of the National Union of Conservative Associations from 1897 to 1956, on microfiche. The Communist Party is represented by a collection of pamphlets for 1947-1982 and by files of the Daily Worker (1943-66) and the Morning Star (1966-). For the contemporary political scene, the library continues to collect publications of the various parties, interest and pressure groups, and general election propaganda. A special effort has been made, as well, to collect leaflets, pamphlets, and other printed matter setting forth the points of view of the various factions in Northern Ireland since 1969. The collection acquired the first microfilms of the pamphlet collection on the "troubles," brought together by the Linen Hall Library, and a set of stunning photographs of Belfast political wall paintings by Ciaran MacGowan for the period 1981-1988. Holdings for Italy span the period from 1914 to the present, with special emphasis on the fascist era, World War II, the Italian underground movement, and political developments from the late 1950s on. Parliamentary debates and government documents are held from 1909 to 1938 for the proceedings of the Chamber of Deputies and from 1909 to 1944 for those of the Senate; diplomatic documents for the years 1914-1943, issued by the Commissione per la pubblicazione dei documenti diplomatici, are also in the collection. World War I is covered by holdings of various official publications, such as L'esercito italiano nella grande guerra, 1915-1918, and Collanna di monografie storiche sulla guerra del 1915-1918. The fascist period is documented by La legislazione fascista (1922-43); News Notes on Fascist Corporations (1932-36); and newspapers and periodicals, among which are Gerachia: Rassegna mensile della rivoluzione fascista (1922-1942) and the Atti of the Partito nazionale fascista. For World War II, Hoover holds official histories of the army and navy; special collections of propaganda leaflets issued by the German High Command in Italy, 1944-1945; and original resistance movement documents of the Comitato di liberazione nazionale and the Partito d'azione. For the study of postwar government reorganization, an important file is the proceedings and the documents of the Constituent Assembly. Italy's uneasy political balance continues to be followed via purchased publications on current politics and government and election propaganda material. In addition, current collecting on Italy stresses the rise of the industrialized north, the redevelopment of the Mezzogiorno, the struggles against the Mafia, and the recent changes in the electoral system. The core of the Spanish collections consists of monographs, newspapers, periodicals, ephemera, and archival documents on the Civil War (1936-39), the latter including strong holdings on foreign participation, personal narratives, pictorial works, and regimental histories, including the International Brigades. A set of microfiches of the Blodgett pamphlet collection at Harvard complements the Hoover Institution's Burnett Bolloten Collection in the archives. Additional Civil War material can be found in the papers of Bertram Wolfe and in the archive of Joaquin Maurín, the founder of the Partido Obrero de Unificación Marxista (POUM), as well as in the Muller and Graeff miniature poster collection and on reel 19 of the Andre Marty archives. For the Franco period, monographs, newspapers such as the Falangist Arriba (1939-74), periodicals, and opposition, separatist, and exile publications were also collected. Initially, the Portuguese collection formed only a background to the collections on the wars and events in Portuguese Africa. For the Salazar and Caetano regimes, the main collecting consisted of official publications and periodicals, since political publications were discouraged. After the 1974 revolution, Hoover took advantage of the great publishing renaissance and attempted to collect as much material as possible in its traditional fields of interest. The library holds many substantial files of several ministries and agencies responsible for colonial affairs since World War I. A series of pamphlets dealing with overseas policy, corporate organizations, labor policy, and economic development, issued for the period 1940-1945 by the Secretariado nacional da informaçáo, was acquired, as well as Portugal: Bulletin of Political, Economic and Cultural Information (1937-56), superseded by Portugal: An Information Review (1956-64 and 1970-73) from the same government office. The published works of Antonio Salazar and Marcello Caetano can be found in the library, as can the published proceedings of the trial of Henrique Galvao in 1952 and the memoirs of Humberto Delgado. The Revolution of the Flowers of April 1974 brought about far-reaching changes in Portugal, divested it of its overseas empire, and established a democratic government in the homeland, which found itself threatened successively by the army, the Left, and the Right. Noteworthy materials for this period include the second edition of Antonio Spinola's Portugal e o futuro; the memoirs of Marcello Caetano, Depoimento; the publications of Alvaro Cunhal, the leader of the Communist Party; and the works of Mario Soares, the head of the Socialist Party. Of particular interest is the rare file of Boletim Informativo (September 1974-August 1975), issued by the Movimento das forças armadas. A collection of posters and ephemera in the Cornelius Drijver Collection in the archives documents the more colorful aspects of the revolution. Phonotapes of interviews with British, Portuguese, and South African diplomats, politicians, economic advisers and journalists relating to the April 1974 events can be consulted in the Robert Keith Middlemas archival collection. The Institution continues to collect descriptive and analytic accounts of political events and development in Portugal. Guides to the Collection General surveys include Duignan, Peter, ed. The Library of the Hoover Institution on War, Revolution and Peace. Stanford: Hoover Institution Press, 1985. The Library Catalogs of the Western Language Collection of the Hoover Institution, 63 vols. plus supplements. Boston: G. K. Hall, 1969-1977. Surveys of the component collections: Dwyer, Joseph D., ed. Russia, the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe: A Survey of Holdings at the Hoover Institution on War, Revolution and Peace. Stanford: Hoover Institution Press, 1980. Peterson, Agnes F. Western Europe: A Survey of Holdings at the Hoover Institution on War, Revolution and Peace. Stanford: Hoover Institution Press, 1970. Other guides to specific areas of the collection: Boeninger, Hildegard R. The Hoover Library Collection on Germany. Stanford: Hoover Institution Press, 1955. Heinz, Grete, and Agnes F. Peterson. The French Fifth Republic, Continuity and Change, 1966-1970: An Annotated Bibliography. A Sequel to The French Fifth Republic, 1958-1965. Hoover Institution Bibliographical Series, 54. Stanford: Hoover Institution Press, 1974. Heinz, Grete, and Agnes F. Peterson. The French Fifth Republic, Establishment and Consolidation (1958-1965): An Annotated Bibliography of the Holdings of the Hoover Institution. Hoover Institution Bibliographical Series, 44. Stanford: Hoover Institution Press, 1970. Heinz, Grete, and Agnes F. Peterson. NSDAP Hauptarchiv: Guide to the Hoover Institution Microfilm Collection. Stanford: Hoover Institution Press, 1964. Siekierski, Maciej, and Christopher Lazarski. Guide to the Polish Independent Publications, 1976-1990, in the Hoover Institution Archives. Stanford: Hoover Institution Press, 1995. Sworakowski, Witold S. List of Polish Underground Collection (1939-1945) in the Hoover Library. Supplemented and revised by Helena Sworakowska, Stanford, 1961. Stanford, 1948. |
QUICK LINKS: TOOLS: |
